So
many genre productions try so hard to emulate the 1970s and even
1980s, then fail, that one looses track of how often this happens.
The need to have some edge, weight or substance is understandable in
an era of generic boredom, but most fail. Here are two new releases
that get it very wrong and an enduring classic, further restored,
that got it right.

Ravi
Dhar's American Muscle
(2013) has a great idea in updating the prison/revenge tale by having
a man (Nick Principe) finally getting out of jail and going through a
mental checklist of everyone who needs to pay for his lost time. The
cast and lead make sense, the style is consistent and there are some
good ideas here, but anytime the script develops good ideas or
exposition, it is ruined by bad moves, over-the-top violence that
renders things unrealistic and anything a little new is ruined by
several cliches or more. Too bad, because this has potential and
some energy, but in the end, it is a wreck.

A
trailer and feature length audio commentary track are the only
extras.

Eddie
Conna's Hero
Of The Day (2014) has
many of the same ambitions and troubles, with the conceit here being
a would-be filmmaker is out to make a documentary on his childhood
football hero, who is now on the skids and things get so bad that
that the former player's self-destructive behavior starts to endanger
the director/fan and crew. Arriving when the actual NFL has racked
up the most scandals in the history of the league, this could have
really capitalized on that timing-wise if it were playing it wiser,
but this gets too silly with its own violence and unreal storyline.
Of course, it is in the shadow of superior films like The
Wrestler and especially
Raging Bull,
but nowhere in their league. Sad, because this too could have really
worked if they just concentrated more and showed some restraint with
more coherence.

Extras
include a Slide Show, Trailer and Producer Interview.

We
have covered three versions of Tobe Hooper's The
Texas Chain Saw Massacre
(1974), so the new single 40th
Anniversary Blu-ray is
the latest upgrade and our fourth look at the still-imitated slasher
groundbreaker. For those who have somehow missed the film and have
limited knowledge of it, here are our links to previous editions:

Dark
Sky has issued several versions of the new upgrade, including a
Blu-ray/DVD set and collector's gift box with two Blu-rays and two
DVDs. We have the single Blu-ray and even that offers the real main
event this time around in a new 4K restoration from the original 16mm
film elements. As noted before, the film was shot on Kodak's special
16mm ECO stock
(#7252) that was very hard to expose, but like reversal, the print
you get is your master copy except that this cannot be projected or
is an actual negative. Yet, you can make prints from it as Michael
Wadleigh did when shooting Woodstock
(1970), so way back for the Pioneer edition (as noted before), a new
16mm inter-negative was made, but those stocks often have a yellowish
cast and this DVD shows that. Easy to scratch, these stocks did
produce very good looking duplicate prints, including the kinds that
were blown up to 35mm like copies I have seen and that first Blu-ray
was a revelation only rivaled by my 35mm theatrical screening.

More
on the results of the upgrade in a minute, but know this version's
extras only offer four audio commentary tracks, two old (one with
Hooper, Gunnar Hansen and DP Daniel Pearl, the other the recently
deceased Marilyn Burns, Allen Danziger, Paul A. Partain and
Production Designer Robert Burns) and two new (a second one by
Hooper, plus Pearl back with Editor J. Larry Carroll and Sound
Recordist Ted Nicolaou) but no trailers, posters, teasers or the
like. Also for big fans and completists, the belated Texas
Chain Saw Massacre 2
arrived on Blu-ray in the U.S., but also in a more extensive version
from Arrow U.K. with extras you will not see anywhere else and you
can read more about it at this link:

The
1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on the new
Chain Saw
can still show the age of the materials used, but this time, a new 4K
upgrade was made by cleaning and upgrading each frame digitally, one
at a time. The result is less noise, less excess grain, better
depth, better detail and really good color, yet some detail is not as
outstanding as it could be and I wonder if the extras cut down on the
bitrate. Still, this is narrowly better than the last Blu-ray and
the preferred way to see the film now, but I bet there is more detail
here from that new 4K master and this proves yet again how great 16mm
can look in high definition on Blu-ray.

So
much so that the 1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image
transfer on Muscle
is more generic, an HD shoot with sometimes weak shots, more motion
blur than there should be and its otherwise consistent look foiled by
too many flaws. The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on Hero
has much the same problem, but is softer and a bit worse.

As
for sound, Chain
Saw
is listed as having Dolby TrueHD 7.1 sound, but there are actually
four sound options and none of them are from
Dolby. Instead, we get a DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 7.1 lossless mix
that is pushing things a bit, a DTS-HD
MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix that
was my personal choice for the best of the four despite some slight
harshness and bests the older standard DTS mix on the older Blu-ray
for sonic range and detail, PCM
2.0 Stereo that is not bad if not great and original PCM 2.0 Mono
that is too compressed for its own good.

Muscle
has a DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix has the best sound
here despite some harshness on the edges and a little overdone sound,
but its soundfield is meant to be loud and in that respect, it is
consistent. The lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo on Hero
is odd and tends to be limited to the front and center channels, Pro
Logic-like surrounds activated or not. The recording is not great
and be careful of volume switching and high levels.